ROMEOVILLE, Ill. — Amazon is holding a giant job fair and plans to make thousands of job offers on the spot at nearly a dozen U.S. warehouses.

Wednesday's hiring spree is a sign of Amazon's growth at a time traditional retailers are closing stores and cutting jobs.

The company will hold job fairs at 10 of its warehouses — including those in Romeoville and Kenosha, Wisconsin from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m.

Nearly 40,000 of the 50,000 packing, sorting and shipping jobs will be full time; most of them will count toward Amazon's previously announced goal of adding 100,000 full-time workers by the middle of next year. Amazon plans to hire around 2500 people in the Chicago area.

The event is taking place at Amazon shipping sites around the country.

One labor expert, Anthony Carnevale at Georgetown University, says more people are likely to lose jobs in brick-and-mortar stores than get jobs in Amazon warehouses. But he says Amazon's warehouse jobs provide good wages and could help build skills.